Update on Liturgy Committee Meeting

One of the important advisory committees we have in the parish is our Liturgy committee which meets most months from Sept to May to review, discuss and evaluate the way we worship at St Matthew’s. The committee consists of various men and women of varying ages who reflect the various aspects of the liturgical life of our community: Music Ministry, art and environment team, Lectors, Ministers of Communion, Youth, and Ushers. It is a very lively and fun committee that is very open and shares a great deal of laughter at our sessions.

As we are doing with our Pastoral Staff and Pastoral Council our Liturgy committee this year is taking the first part of each meeting to discuss a very insightful book about renewing parish life entitled “Divine renovation” by a Canadian pastor, Fr. James Mallon. Mallon offers us great insights and challenges into parish life. Two very pertinent topics came up at our October meeting I would like to share with you.

In reading the section entitled “Giving Priority To the Weekend” we got into a lively discussion on the length of Sunday mass at St Matthew’s. This topic came up at our Oct. Pastoral Council meeting as well.

Mallon offers some good insights into this topic which I would like to quote: “Sunday Eucharist ought to be a production in the best sense of the word. I presume here a positive connotation of the word production. To give our best for the Lord so that people who come to our church can leave with a sense of “wow”. Why shouldn’t this utterance be genuinely on the lips of our parishioners as it would be coming from a great concert or sporting event? Evangelical and Pentecostal churches sing for an hour before the pastor delivers his sermon. He is not going to preach for less than half an hour. So why are Catholics so different in thinking that the faster the mass the better?

We formed the habit of these fast track masses back in the old days when our churches were overflowing and most American parishes had to have mass on the hour throughout the morning from 6 AM to noon... IN the 1950’s it was not unusual in North America for parishes to have eight or nine masses on a Sunday. The context that conditioned Catholics to get addicted to the 45-minite mass no longer exists, but the practice lingers on.

In the end, it is not really the question of how long the mass ought to be or could be, but whether this value leads to health. I believe it does not. It contributes to our “get it over and one with “mentality that turns our Eucharistic celebrations into something to be endured rather than something that endures.

In all the times I have crossed over the one hour mark, I have never seen a single person turn into a pumpkin. Where does this value come from? Sports events are never less than an hour. If we went to a concert that lasted only an hour we would want our money back. Movie and plays are at last 2 hours in length but “Thou shalt not go over an hour for mass.”

As a committee we openly discussed Mallon’s views and felt that to keep mass to an hour in our parish was our goal realizing the many activities and busy lives we all share. When we have an extra speaker at mass or a Baptism at mass we do try to alter/shorten some other aspects of the mass to maintain out time frame. However, at times we do go over and we hope that people of our community would see this as an opportunity to grow in faith and just spend that bit of extra time to worship the God who has given us all such abundant blessings.

We have added the LWWC and Family liturgy for the 10 AM mass in the hopes that this would make worship more in tune with our children. We have received many good comments regarding this.

Hopefully, we can see the liturgy as not something “to be endured” but rather as an opportunity to give us something, our personal contact with our God that is “to be enduring for our lives”. Mass is not so much something that we need to “get something out of” but rather our opportunity to give something back to our creator, true and joyful worship.

The other topic of importance that came up was the use of languages such as Latin and Spanish in our music at mass.

We recalled we are a part of a Catholic family that has roots in the centuries of people before us who have created beautiful, uplifting and reverent music to praise God. We are not just a Church of the present. We are not just a Church of English speaking people. We are Catholic, the Universal Body of Christ. We have a wonderful patrimony from which to draw in our worship. How often people request the classics “Ave Maria” or “Panis Angelicus” for weddings and funerals. How much delight we have when we hear something like Mozart’s “Ave Verum”. All of these are a part of our Latin heritage.

If we watched any of the Papal masses of the recent visit of Pope Francis to our country or if you have ever been to the Vatican for mass or several European churches we would hear many musical selections in Latin, including parts of the mass to which we are very familiar in our own native language. At St Matthew’s in Lent we have sang the ancient Greek words of the Mass ”Kyrie, Christi Eleison” (Lord/Christ have mercy.) The recent Pope’s celebrations in the USA were truly uplifted by the lively and vibrant music of our Latin sisters and brothers who make up 30% our Catholic population in this country.

Last Advent and Christmas season we sang the Latin words for the Lamb of God in the “Agnus Dei” of the old Latin Mass of the Angels.

In doing so we are appreciating and passing on a valuable part of we are as a Catholic family with deep roots and rich traditions. The occasional use of Latin is not “retro’ ( no one has ever accused me of being “retro”) but rather an appreciation of our past.

We hope as time goes on we will welcome certain Latin pieces in our worship, not to diminish us but rather to enhance us a people.

I am so very thankful for the insights and gifts we receive from our Liturgy committee to help us worship more fully and more reverently week after week.